Thursday, July 21, 2005

100 agricultural workers from the Galilee and Golan Heights blocked the route from Rosh Pina to Kiryat Shmona on Thursday to protest the growing crisis in the fruit growing industry in the area, Army Radio reported.

Let me know if they get blasted in our media as threatening Israeli democracy and are portrayed as violent and extremist elements.

On July 11, 2005, Seymour D. Reich, President of the Israel Policy Forum, an American organization, provided a unique glimpse into the thinking of those who are leading this country. In a letter to the editor published in the New York Times, Reich, a former chairman of the Presidents' Conference, informed us that Ehud Olmert, Israel's vice prime minister, spoke before an audience in New York in June and announced: "We are tired of fighting, we are tired of being courageous, we are tired of winning, we are tired of defeating our enemies."

What is probably most remarkable about Olmert's words is that they went unreported at the time, and not that they represent one of the most abject and defeatist formulations of statecraft in the history of diplomacy. Even Neville Chamberlain at Munich in 1938 was a bit more optimistic while serving up Czechoslovakia's Sudentenland.

Israel's media manages to get its information from Foreign Ministry cables, interested parties in the American Jewish establishment, politicos and officials from within the State Department and Pentagon, and from leaks directly from those who utter them or their aides. Our media delights in scandal and headlining seemingly embarrassing remarks. That such a statement, if true, and Olmert has not denied saying what Reich claims he said, was missed, or perhaps ignored, is a troubling development for this country's democracy.

It was Amnon Avramovicz, prime time Channel Two commentator and recognized razor-tongued expert of sardonic wit, who coined the now infamous "Etrog box" paradigm of Israel's media. According to Avramovicz's instructions to his fellow milieu members, the ultimate elitist clique and last stronghold of dogmatic left-liberalism, Ariel Sharon is to be cushioned, that is, untouched by criticism in the media. Until September, the month the expulsion of the Jewish population of communities in Gaza and northern Samaria is to be a fait accompli, the media is to avoid any mention of personal criminal and unethical matters that Sharon, his sons, his advisors, his employees and anyone else connected to this evacuation operation.

Avramovicz, along with many other leading dimmed lights in the media, make no secret of their support, encouragement and enthusiastic defense of Sharon's policies that serve their end as well: Israel's exit from the disputed territories. This dovetailing of goals overrides any professional, ethical or legal restriction that would otherwise act as a barrier to what Avramovicz wants done, and, a la the Olmert statement, is being done.

The "etrog box" media behavior, of course, is nothing less than a subversion of Israel's democracy. Thus, what is being done to some 10,000 Jews is described as "disengagement" when, in the first instance, it is nothing less than a depopulation of ethnic cleansing. Disengagement will not happen. Terror will continue, as the opponents of evacuation claimed, and Israel will engage the enemy. Arabs will continue to demand the 'right of return' to Isdud (Ashdod), Iskalon (Ashkelon), Bir Saba (Be'er Sheba) and Jaffa and will be engaged in their propaganda campaign on its behalf. Gazans are to enter Israel as a work force, and Israel will supply water and electricity and other services.

Moreover, the main reason that Sharon has embarked on a complete reversal of political orientation; i.e., the demographic threat to Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, is now being well served by a demand of the American administration. That demand is for the "disengagement" funds of over $2 billion to go, in the main, to Arab, Bedouin and Druze projects in Israel. Only a third of the money will fund the redeployment of Israel Defense Forces troops outside the Gaza Strip.

The aid package must go, the United States demands, for the purpose of developing the Galilee and Negev. We now witness a new New Israel Fund blossoming. An American official was quoted as saying, "America is not the Jewish Agency nor the Jewish National Fund, and considers it important that the aid serves all sectors of the Israeli population." This, of course, is a worthy redistribution of Israel's national budget. What is unworthy, however, is the way America is forcing Israel to do its bidding and how the media is not helping Israelis understand what the future holds based on this element and others.

Is America still behind Sharon's "settlement blocs" program or is President George W. Bush, in referring to the 1949 armistice lines, signaling the re-division of Jerusalem? Was Sharon wise in refusing to link the London bombings with Israel after we now are informed that one of the UK bombers may have been part of the Mike's Place attack in Tel Aviv? Is the so-called demographic threat solely an external problem, resolved by evacuating Gaza, or is it internal? And how negative is it exactly?

These are but a few of the questions for which Israel's media must provide a fair and balanced forum for discussion and dialogue. Their involvement and responsibility for Israel's future is no less than that of a prime minister or the leader of the opposition. That is how a true democracy works.

Wednesday, July 20, 2005

Let there be no mistake regarding the decision about to be made in the Gush Katif area today: It is not the fate of the disengagement that is at stake, but the ability of Israeli democracy to continue to function.

The demonstrators wish not merely to sabotage the evacuation, but to replace the government; they are using non-kosher means to achieve it..

...While Orlev's legislation initiative is a constitutional, legitimate act, the mass march on the gates of Gaza is the complete opposite...

...By using the right to freedom of protest, and by complaining about the allegedly nondemocratic reaction of the police, the demonstrators are throwing sand in the public's eyes...

Benziman doesn't know his democracy and protest history.

What about Gandhi's 1930 Dandi March and broke a bizarre British law. He and 78 fellow marchers walked for 23 days over 240 miles to pick up a lump of mud and salt on the Indian coast. Thousands then made salt illegally all over the country. Within days, tens of thousands were in jail. And the marches from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. and when 2,200 protesters were arrested for demonstrating at the Nevada Test site.

Or when Bertrand Russell and the Committee of 100 at Trafalgar Square on 19 September 1961 after the home secretary banned any public procession for the 24 hours starting at midnight on Saturday 16 September. On the day itself protesters gathered in the square to march at midnight when the ban was supposed to end. Arrests began at 5.07 pm and continued throughout the evening, often with considerable police violence. At the end of the protest over 1,300 arrests had been made from a demonstration of around 10,000 people.

Jonathan Wilson published a review of Hillel Halkin's book on the NILI group and Zichron Yaakov. And he found the need, when referring to the matter of murder in mandated Palestine, to write "Jews were hacked to pieces in Hebron and Arabs massacred in Deir Yessin".

In the first instance, the Jews slaughtered in Hebron in 1929 were an innocent civilian population, many of them non-Zionists of the ultra-orthodox Hareidi community, who had made no menacing moves against their Arab neighbors for decades. The Arabs killed in Deir Yassin in 1948 recently had enjoined the aggressive war against the as-yet-not born state of Israel as they had done in riots of 1920, 1929 and 1938. They directed sniper fire at the Jewish neighborhood of Bet HaKerem but five days before the attack on their own village which had become a base for Arab irregulars from Iraq as well as local Arab bands.

There was no massacre at Deir Yassin.

There was house-to-house combat, which was not the most professional military operation ever conducted, which caused, something usually overlooked, the attacking Jewish force 5 dead and over 40 wounded. A loudspeaker had been brought in to warn the residents to leave and most did, via the Ein Kerem route. Have you ever heard of a massacre in which its victims were warned to flee by a loudspeaker?

Wild-eyed estimates of 250 dead were corrected by Arab sources by the early 1980s as no more than 110. Of these, the only claim of a "massacre" were supposedly less than 20 Arabs who were led off to a stone quarry, the story goes, and shot there.

The BBC documentary "The Fifty Years War, Israel and the Arabs", confirms that the rumors of a massacre were initiated by Arab propagandists who are named. One week later, over seventy Jews in a convoy of Hadassah Hospital medical staff were slaughterd. Now, that indeed was a massacre.

Monday, July 11, 2005

Just after I finished putting up the previous entry on the lack of understanding of correct nonviolent methods. this below came across my screen. It's from the Gush Shalom list, those people who are protesting the fence construction who have so far taken out one soldier's eye and indirectly led another Border policeman to his death when he fell off a cliff and was stoned by nonviolent Arabs.

Anyway, it shows what can be done without much fanfare.

"An armoured jeep was parked across the road, and in front of it were five soldiers and an officer. Quite sufficient to block any vehicle - but we have left our bus inconspicuously parked near the giant settlement of Kiryat Sefer and continued on foot, easily by-passing the blockading soldiers. The lieutenant could be clearly heard, speaking into his communicator: "Too many people, sir, we could do nothing"...

The National Home (Bayit Leumi) movement, responsible for recent road obstructions, announced Sunday evening a new mission, "Displacing the displacement camp," calling for demonstrators and their supporters to come to the Gama camp, an army base outside the Gaza Strip where forces that will take part in the disengagement will reside.

The organization's announcement calls for the crowds expected to march within a week to Gush Katif to reach the Gama camp, where "each one of them will take the rod of one tent and move it a few hundred meters from the camp."

The announcement also states that this action will terminate the "organizational ability of the expulsion forces for a long period."

"This kind of action has many advantages. First of all, it is in line with all of the criteria of nonviolent civil disobedience. It will not be violent, and it is directed precisely at the regime representatives designated to execute the crime," the declaration said.

I think I have a little experience in nonviolent protests.

One can block, one can sit-down, one can take over an office and prevent normal work from proceeding, one can offer an alternative service, but one cannot "grab a tent pole and move it".

What I have tried to suggest to anyone listening is a bit of pre-march planning so that on the march, if the marchers are blocked, they should regroup, organize themselves into rows of, say, 100, put 50 meters between themselves, and them rebegin marching.

The rationale?

There are just so many soldiers and policemen and it actually is easier to control a large crowd. Once the group breaks up, more security forces are needed to control. If stopped, the row veers off - one to the right, one to the left, one straight ahead.

If stopped, the group sits down - it does not forcefully push ahead. If this happens, within an hour, there will be rows and rows of hundreds of marchers all over an area of several square dunams and eventually, there will not be enough security personnel to control and then some are going to be able to continue walking.

Basically, chaos will break out. This is in a wide-open area remember, not your downtown street. Of course, though, eventually, there is the entrance into Gush Katif, and that's where it should all come to a halt, one way or the other.

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

Someone wants to do a poll, and use it as an instrument to convince the populace that their prime minister is not to be trusted.

I think this series of questions not only will elicit information about the thinking of those polled, but will hopefully plant doubt into their minds so that the very act of conducting the poll and the gathering on statistical information will bring about a change of thinking.

Here's how I would phrase the questions and in what order:-

1. Do you support the so-called Disengagement plan?2. If yes, did you vote for Amram Mitzna in the last election or Ariel Sharon?3. Do you think PM Sharon was right to fire two ministers even before they had a chance to vote in the government on the Disengagement Plan?4. Do you think that the demographic situation is the real reason for Sharon promoting this plan?5. Do you think terror will cease or decrease after Disengagement?6. Do you think America will stop pressuring Israel for further retreats from the territories?7. Do you think the Arabs have given up on the "right of return"?8. If you have answered 'no' to the last four questions, do you still support the so-called Disengagement plan and why?9. Dop you think the media should term the plan as one of expulsion or uprooting rather than Disengagement?10. Do you believe a national referendum should have been conducted?

Tuesday, July 05, 2005

As we proceed towards disengagement, I am reminded of this tale of Rebbe Nachman of Bratzlav.

Once upon a time, the King turned to his beloved advisor and said,"I see in my star-gazing visions that the wheat growing this year will cause those who eat of it to go crazy. What shall we do?"

"Let us prepare enough wheat from other sources so that we won't have to eat of this poisoned wheat."

"But then," replied the King, "all the world will be crazy and only we will be sane. In this situation and because will probably won't have enough wheat, we will also have to eat of the wheat."

"But I propose that we place a mark on our foreheads so that we shall know that we are crazy for we will look at each other and the sign will tell us we're crazy."

However, I always thought the ending should have been "for we will look at each other and the sign will tell us we were once sane."

Now, though, that the 'safe passage' idea is back (the route that will facilitate the transfer of war materiel into Judea & Samaria), and that the PA's pretty boy Dahlan wants two more kilometers of Israel (and the destruction of Netiv Ha'Asarah)and the Hamas trumpets the next stage of Kassam attacks to hit Afula, Hadera, et al., I realize that the best our politicans can do is recall that they are crazy. To remember and comprehend the concept of sanity - that is all gone.

Friday, July 01, 2005

Given the inability of certain leadership groups and people to plan out a proper protest campaign here, I think that Saul Alinsky's principles need repeating. These are excerpted from Rules for Radicals by Saul Alinsky, pp. 126-140 and they are classic.===================

Tactics mean doing what you can with what you have. Tactics are those conscious deliberate acts by which human beings live with each other and deal with the world around them. In the world of give and take, tactics is the art of how to take and how to give. Here our concern is with the tactic of taking; how the Have-Nots can take power away from the Haves.

For an elementary illustration of tactics, take parts of your face as the point of reference; your eyes, your ears, and your nose. First the eyes; if you have organized a vast, mass-based people's organization, you can parade it visibly before the enemy and openly show your power. Second the ears; if your organization is small in numbers, then...conceal the members in the dark but raise a din and clamor that will make the listener believe that your organization numbers many more than it does. Third, the nose; if your organization is too tiny even for noise, stink up the place.

Always remember the first rule of power tactics:

Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.

The second rule is: Never go outside the experience of your people. When an action is outside the experience of the people, the result is confusion, fear, and retreat.

The third rule is: Wherever possible go outside of the experience of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.

The fourth rule is: Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.

The fourth rule carries within it the fifth rule: Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.

The sixth rule is: A good tactic is one that your people enjoy. If your people are not having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.

The seventh rule is: A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. man can sustain militant interest in any issue for only a limited time, after which it becomes a ritualistic commitment...

The eighth rule: Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose.

The ninth rule: The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.

The tenth rule: The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.

The eleventh rule is: If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside; this is based on the principle that every positive has its negative...

The twelfth rule: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. you cannot risk being trapped by the enemy in his sudden agreement with your demand and saying "You're right--we don't know what to do about this issue. Now you tell us."

In conflict tactics there are certain rules that the organizer should always regard as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and "frozen." By this I mean that in a complex, interrelated, urban society, it becomes increasingly difficult to single out who is to blame for any particular evil. There is a constant, and somewhat legitimate, passing of the buck....

It should be borne in mind that the target is always trying to shift responsibility to get out of being the target....

One of the criteria in picking your target is the target's vulnerability--where do you have the power to start? Furthermore, the target can always say, "Why do you center on me when there are others to blame as well?" When you "freeze the target," you disregard these arguments and, for the moment, all others to blame.

Then, as you zero in and freeze your target and carry out your attack, all of the "others" come out of the woodwork very soon. They become visible by their support of the target.

The other important point in the choosing of a target is that it must be a personification, not something general and abstract such as a community's segregated practices or a major corporation or City Hall. It is not possible to develop the necessary hostility against, say, City Hall, which after all is a concrete, physical, inanimate structure, or against a corporation, which has no soul or identity, or a public school administration, which again is an inanimate system.

About Me

American born, my wife and I moved to Israel in 1970. We have lived at Shiloh together with our family since 1981. I was in the Betar youth movement in the US and UK. I have worked as a political aide to Members of Knesset and a Minister during 1981-1994, lectured at the Academy for National Studies 1977-1994, was director of Israel's Media Watch 1995-2000 and currently, I work at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem. I was a guest media columnist on media affairs for The Jerusalem Post, op-ed contributor to various journals and for six years had a weekly media show on Arutz 7 radio. I serve as an unofficial spokesperson for the Jewish Communities in Judea & Samaria.